The Balearic Water Agency (Abaqua) yesterday approved the emergency action that will allow the installation of a new sewage pipe in the auditorium of es Caló de s’Oli. It is expected that the work will begin today and will last approximately two weeks, which will mean that there will be traffic cuts in the adjoining streets. The Department of Environment estimate that the sewage pipeline works will cost about 400,000 euros.

It should be recalled that the current pipe broke on Monday at noon and since then has continued expelling fecal discharges. At first, operators tried to control it with trucks, but yesterday the flow was of such magnitude that they were forced to divert them into the sea.

This meant that a contingency plan had to be activated to minimize, as far as possible, the effects of the sewage leak. “We have two shoreline cleanup vessels working and we will hire divers to conduct seabed cleanup,” they indicated. However, the boats that left in the morning had to return to the port of Ibiza due to “bad seas”.

Concern in Sant Josep for continued sewage leaks

For its part, from the City Council of Sant Josep showed their “concern” for a problem that is repeated every few months. “It is a very old fiber cement pipe that has already fulfilled its useful life. Abaqua has contacted us to explain that they are going to change the entire section of the current sewage pipe, which goes from the pumping station,” said mayor Ángel Luis Guerrero. With this and the actions that can be taken in the future to improve the facilities, he hopes that these discharges will cease to be repeated.

Also the president of the environmental group GEN-GOB, Joan Carles Palerm, described the situation as “very serious”. “We are surprised that there is a problem of this magnitude. The island should have prepared to solve this type of situation before. A maintenance problem can lead to a rupture, but what is not acceptable is that we have to endure days of fecal discharges without a minimum of certainty of when they will end,” he criticized.

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